Montana Sky

Absurdly touched, Tess nudged Lily so that she could slide out. “That’s my cue to leave you gentlemen to your port and cigars while I go up and do something exciting like paint my toenails.”
    Appreciating her, Ben grinned. “I bet they’re real pretty, too.”
    “Sweetheart, they are awesome.” It was simple to decide she liked him. And not a very large step from there to decide to trust him. “I guess I’ll range myself with Adam and say I’m grateful you were here. Good night.”
    “I’ll go too.” Lily reached down for Tess’s half-eaten bowl of soup.
    “Don’t go.” Adam laid a hand over hers. “You haven’t eaten.”
    “You’ll want to talk. I can take it up with me.”
    “Don’t run off on my account.” Pretty sure that he saw how the wind blew here, Ben slid off the bench. “I’ve got to get home. I appreciate the meal, Lily.” He reached up to touch her cheek, felt her instinctive wince of defense. Smoothly, he dropped his hand, as if the moment hadn’t happened. “You eat while it’s hot,” he advised. “I’ll be around tomorrow, Adam.”
    “Good night, Ben.” Adam kept his hand over Lily’s, giving it a coaxing tug until she sat again. Then he took her other hand, linked his fingers in hers, and waited until she lifted her eyes to his. “Don’t be afraid. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
    “I’m always afraid.”
    Her hands flexed under his, but he judged it was time to take the chance, so he continued to hold them. “You came to a strange place, with only strangers around you. And you stayed. There’s courage there.”
    “I only came to hide. You don’t know me, Adam.”
    “I will when you let me.” He released one of her hands, lifted his own, and brushed his thumb over the faded bruise beneath her eye. She went very still, watched him warily as he traced his thumb down to the marks on her jaw. “I want to know you, Lily, when you’re ready.”
    “Why?”
    His eyes smiled and stirred her heart. “Because you understand horses, and you sneak kitchen scraps to my dogs.” The smile moved to his mouth when she flushed. “And because you make good soup. Now, eat,” he said, and released her hand. “Before it’s cold.”
    Watching him from under her lashes, she picked up her spoon and ate.
    Upstairs, armed with a book she’d chosen from the library and a bottle of mineral water she’d taken from behind the bar, Tess walked toward her room. She had decided to read until her eyes crossed, hoping that it would bring her undisturbed and dreamless sleep.
    Her imagination was much too vivid, she thought. It was the very reason she was beginning to make her mark as a screenwriter. And the very reason that the details Ben had provided were going to shift and stir until they formed many ugly visions in her head.
    She had great hope that the thick paperback romance whose cover promised plenty of passion and adventure would steer her mind to other venues.
    Then she passed Willa’s door and heard the bitter, broken weeping. She hesitated, wished to hell she’d thought to come up the other stairs. More, wished the helpless sobbing didn’t touch a chord in her. When a strong woman wept, she thought, the tears came from the deepest and darkest corners of the heart.
    She lifted a hand to knock, then on an oath just laid herpalm on the wood. Perhaps if they had known each other, or if they had been complete strangers, she could have gone in. If they had had no ghosts between them, no harbored resentments, she could have opened that door and offered . . . something.
    But she knew she wouldn’t be welcomed. There could be no woman-to-woman comfort here, much less sister to sister. And realizing she was sorry for that, very sorry, she continued to her own room, carefully closed, carefully locked the door behind her.
    But she no longer thought her dreams would be undisturbed.
     
    I N THE DARK . IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT WHEN THE wind kicked up and threatened and the rain came hard and vicious, he lay smiling. Reliving every moment of the kill, second by second, brought a curious thrill.
    It had been like being someone else while it was happening, he realized. Someone with vision so clear, with nerves so steady, he was barely human.
    He hadn’t known he’d had that inside him.
    He hadn’t known he would like it so much.
    Poor old Pickles. To keep from laughing aloud, he pressed both hands to his mouth like a child giggling in church. He hadn’t had